^"I's^^l Recetit Literature. 239 



using words which may seem to be extravagantly laudatory. Perhaps we 

 may say simply, by way of conveying our appreciation of its real merit, 

 that only one ornithologist who has ever lived, or who is now living, 

 could have written it. In purport and scope, it is a critical review of 

 ornithology, from the start to such degree of finish as the science has 

 acquired today ; in substance, it is a summary bibliography of those works 

 upon which the foundations of the science rest most securely, and of those 

 which have most contributed to its permanent superstructure — ' each after 

 its kind' being set forth in chronological order, in proper historical per- 

 spective, with due regard for symmetrical proportion ; in form, by which 

 we mean its literary style, it is a model to be admired by all but success- 

 fully imitated by none. Professor Newton's ripe scholarship has perhaps 

 never been more adequately shown than on this occasion, when only a 

 master of the art of exposition, who combined in himself the qualities 

 of a great ornithologist and a great bibliographer, could have brought his 

 forces to bear upon the business in hand with the requisite lucidity and 

 precision. The literature of ornithology is so huge — indeed, Professor 

 Newton speaks of the science as in danger of being smothered there- 

 under — that one might well be dismayed in face of any undertaking to set 

 it forth intelligibly, with hardly more than a hundred pages at command 

 in which to accentuate its strong points and stigmatize its weak or 

 futile ones, with even-handed justice throughout — so almost incessant, 

 in this case, must have been the temptation to mercy. For performances 

 whose chief or only merit may be found in those good intentions with 

 which a certain mythical locality is said to be paved, Professor Newton's 

 good-nature is unfailing, as his patience is unwearied. But for the 

 sciolists and shams of whatever low degree, for the posers and plagiarists 

 of whatever high pretentions, for any writers whose good faith may be 

 questioned or whose good opinion of themselves is vanity — vce victis ! 

 The schoolmaster is abroad, and his ferule is felt to be a stinging one. 

 For pith and pungency Professor Newton's criticisms compare not 

 unfavoi-ably with Huxley's. They are equally pointed and polished ; 

 they are passed with equal courtesy and dignity; they are geneiallv 

 tempered with some saving clause, whether to be passed to the credit of 

 the critic's charity or of his ingenuity we cannot always say ; but he 

 seldom presents the chastening rod in one hand without holding out a 

 box of ointment in the other. It reminds us of Kamadeva, the Hindu 

 Eros — him of the bee-strung bow, whose keenest shafts were tipped with 

 roses. 



In so phrasing his parable the present reviewer feels sure he voices no 

 sentiments unshared by others of his own craft. Referring to the article 

 'Ornithology' in the Ninth Edition of the 'Encyclopaedia Britannica ' — 

 it is well known that the present ' Dictionary ' is founded upon the series 

 of articles contributed by Professor Newton to that publication, modified 

 into something like continuity, and further built up by the intercalation 

 of a much greater number, to serve the same end — a distinguished leader 



